As president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, Narayanaswami Srinivasan, 67, heads an organisation whose reputation is inversely proportional to the popularity of the game it represents.

It is undoubtedly rich, but also seen as opaque, politics-ridden, arrogant and resistant to change. Srinivasan the bold, savvy corporate chieftain is what an observer would think the organisation badly needs. What it has got is Srinivasan the cautious traditionalist.

When he took over the reins of the world's most powerful cricketing body in September 2011, India's World Cup win six months earlier had already lost its sparkle. The cricket-loving public had not only gone through an exhaustingly long Indian Premier League but also had to suffer the whitewash against England.

Srinivasan couldn't have imagined a poorer start to his stint. A team that was expected to conquer Australia down under came back with its tail between its legs. Worse, it couldn't make it to the finals of the four-nation Asia Cup, having been defeated by lowly Bangladesh in a match where Sachin Tendulkar made his hundredth international century.

The Cricket Challenge

Srinivasan, the cricket fanatic, isn't the one to easily forget such mortification. Some years ago, one of his top league teams in Chennai shockingly succumbed to an ordinary bank team. A few days later, Srinivasan bumped into one of his players in the office corridor and didn't forget to ask him, "So how many more bank teams to lose to?"

Yet, as BCCI president, he has to be careful with words. Srinivasan pauses to think for an answer. Several seconds pass before he comes back with one of the many understatements that characterise his official interviews. "One is acutely aware that when the team doesn't do well, we get more than our share of attention," he says.

The challenge before him is actually steep. A cricketing defeat isn't taken too kindly. Not only does Srinivasan need to oversee India's revival on the world stage but also enable a crucial transition to younger players. It's also a time when cricket can't have, as it used to, a sole claim to an Indian's sporting mindspace.

2002: Becomes president of the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association, after being vice-president for four years under rival AC Muthiah

2005: Becomes BCCI treasurer, as Sharad Pawar takes over as president

2007: Sanmar Group's N Sankar & N Kumar sell their stakes in India Cements and resign from the board. It was their grandfather who co-founded the company in 1946

2008: Srinivasan's India Cements wins bid for the Chennai IPL team Becomes BCCI general secretary, as Shashank Manohar takes over as president

2009: Strengthens control of India Cements by buying out his brother N Ramachandran

2011: Takes charge as BCCI president

If some expect the BCCI under Srinivasan to eagerly embrace innovation, effect wholesale changes in how the sport is run and manage to present a more endearing image of itself, they might well be disappointed. Srinivasan isn't the one who will oblige them.

Rather, what he promises is a strengthening of cricket at all levels, through academies, umpire development or domestic cricket. "This is a part of administration that's not seen. But all this is happening," he says.

That's where Srinivasan's stewardship of Indian cricket and India Cements, a company of which he is vice-chairman and managing director, differs.

As inheritor of India Cements, co-founded by his father, he has been a daring serial acquirer who fought one of corporate India's most memorable takeover battles in the late 1990s to wrest control of Raasi Cements. As temporary custodian of Indian cricket, he is a steadfast traditionalist suspicious of tinkering with anything connected to the game.

"BCCI is not my grandfather's property; India Cements is," Srinivasan says, making an English version of a colloquial Tamil usage for effect, explaining his contrasting approaches to cricket and cement.

It was in the late 1990s that Srinivasan started building his clout both in his cement business and cricket administration. His cement successes were more obvious, though. About a decade after he became managing director, he took his biggest business gamble ever and almost got it horribly wrong. How he got out of the rut is now the stuff of corporate legend.

Old-timers especially recall his hostile acquisition of Raasi Cements, one of the four purchases that doubled India Cements' capacity and made it a player to be reckoned with. Just when it was ready to go to the market with millions of tonnes of cement, the situation changed. There was oversupply.